The invention relates to a covering made from mechanically interconnectable panels as well as an installing and uninstalling method for such a covering.
Wall, ceiling, and floor coverings, such as for example prefabricated parquet, real wood floors or laminate floorings, consist of several rows of predominantly rectangular panels. Conventionally, the panels have continuous grooves on a longitudinal side and a head side, and, on the respective opposing longitudinal side or head side, respectively, continuous tongues which form fittingly match the grooves. The panels are installed by joining the groove and tongue, wherein the panels of two neighboring rows are arranged offset to each other. It is known to provide the grooves and tongues with mechanical locking means which, in neighboring panels in a floor covering, form a latching engagement with one another. This is intended to prevent the formation of gaps in the installed floor through stretching or shrinking processes. The groove and tongue are provided with mutually matching locking elements in the form of indentations, recesses or projections, to retain connected floor panels in the joined position without the use of adhesives. Normally, the panels are turned or clicked into each other along their longitudinal sides and subsequently shifted sideways, such that locking rails on the head sides engage. To facilitate this, slight hammer strikes can be used in connection with a tapping block. This poses the risk of damage to the panels, even when working most carefully.
Solutions also exist, in which the abutting head sides are connected by a tongue which is displaceable in its longitudinal direction. This obviates the manual tapping-in with a hammer. The tongues are pre-assembled, which obviates the subsequent inserting. Such a floor covering is the subject matter of WO 2008/017301. In this case, a projecting end of a tongue is displaced into a head side groove, to partially displace the tongue from one groove to the corresponding groove of the neighboring panel. In this way the panels are interlocked.
WO 2007/081267 A1 discloses a covering from mechanically interconnectable panels, wherein adjacent first and second panels each have a groove on their mutually complementary sides. In one of the grooves a tongue is arranged, which is displaceable relative to the panel and which is configured to engage in the groove of the adjacent panel when joining the adjacent panels. The panel which holds the tongue has a locking rail which engages underneath the adjacent panel. The locking rail is suited to protect adjacent panels against tensile loading in a plane of installation, wherein the panel engaged underneath by the locking rail is supported by the locking rail as well as a support rail. The support rail is arranged at a greater distance to the locking rail than the groove.
To enable the displacement of the tongue, the tongue must be held with a certain play and inserted into the exactly oriented corresponding opposite groove of the complementary panel. This play is preferably as small as possible to prevent a height offset in the region of the gap clearance of two panels. For technical reasons a certain play cannot be avoided, however.